Syndicate Of Pain is the latest album by Lebanese thrash Metal band Phenomy and it's a concept album about an Asylum and the patients entombed within and the abuse they suffer at the hands of the so-called Doctor Anton Shuman.
The album fades in with Noir an ambient drum and bass style intro that has blasts of noise and feedbacked guitars coming in and out as it builds towards the darkness to come.
Ominous is full on furious as all hell drums and guitars as the growled vocals go on about the voices of evil coming though and they surely are, this is played at super sonic speed as they wrestle to take control of their own destinies once more, in a fear factory meets Sepultura kind of way. The voices come at you from all angles in the mix before the acoustic fade out that sounds like they might be playing an oud.
The Mute, The Deaf, The Blind has a System Of A Down kind of rage and fury going on as the three monkeys are experimented on and they wonder why no one can see or hear what's going on, let alone speak out on behalf of the patients who are the real victims in this asylum.
Bone Orchid has howling from the bowels of hell vocals and the pain and agony at what's been going on, trying to find a way to be defiant while being almost struck dumb with disbelief that this has been allowed to happen.
Downward Spiral is the song that I could most easily hear being reworked into something poppier, but of course it's dark as all hell thrash monster as they growl and scream about being born to suffer.
Lead Me To My Throne lulls you into a false sense of security with a quiet intro before the wall of pain and sorrow rage fueled noise comes crashing in, as you wonder if that throne is something your strapped into, for awful experiments designed to make you regress and unburden yourself of all the pain.
Temptation in this case is to escape and get away from all the pain and despair as they go on about how you will lose it all in the end.
Beyond The Wall Of Sleep is over 8 minutes of a riff that won't give in until it's woken everyone up within three miles of it, as it slowly builds and adds more drums and bass and more noise to keep the trying to bring down the walls. Nearly five minutes in all the music falls away to an acoustic section that you know is going to build towards a final barrage to bring those walls tumbling down to this instrumental.
When The Darkness Comes it comes on slowly and deliberately like dusk is settling in and night will soon be upon us once more and we might actually find a way out of this hellhole, as the sky darkens the guitars crash in and leave us in little doubt that no one who leaves does so unscathed by all the horror that they have either seen or had done to them the nightmares will persist like the monumental guitar solo chiseling away at what's left of your brain.
The album closes with the title track Syndicate of Pain that has full on blast beat drums and raging guitars pummeling your brains into a final act of submission as the very Sepultura style main vocals roar at you and the more gentle counter vocals add some respite, but the are only interested in making sure you feel all the pain they feel.
Find out more at https://www.phenomyofficial.com/ https://www.phenomyofficial.com/store/p/e54fip7sa13ixf0by0y25wmt9u6j8r https://www.facebook.com/Phenomyofficial https://linktr.ee/phenomyband?fbclid=IwAR2cktEXyuQTOSOoF-6_VtgSxyLegAFROGBaPrvjsIGsT9fEJMsQq1cmIZ0
